


no use for sails

by irnan



Category: Marvel Avengers Movies Universe, The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Gen, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-01
Updated: 2012-07-01
Packaged: 2017-11-08 23:44:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/448870
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/irnan/pseuds/irnan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Six times a plan the Avengers made didn't come together, but things were ok, and one time it was someone else's plan for them (and things were still ok).</p>
            </blockquote>





	no use for sails

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Florence (again); excessive amounts of Steve; even more Clint!pov - _is_ there such a thing as excessive Clint pov? - includes an outtake (ok, two outtakes) of sorts from a verse originating in "and don't you dare be late"; Sherlock references; unrealistic medical stuff (aka Tony Stark); Indiana Jones references; began as a five things fic until I realised I had seven parts and liked them all, and let's face it, like Horcruxes, all good things come in sevens.
> 
> Erm.

**(I)**

 

Tony has a Plan. Pepper has instilled in him a fondness for this concept by a sort of Pavlovian training - it's hard to argue with the notion of Having A Plan when you get kissed for every step completed successfully - OK, in fairness to Pepper, Tony's not sure she's done it deliberately, she just likes to kiss him when he's done something she approves of or appreciates, but whatever. The results are the same: Tony fucking Stark Does Plans Now. This Plan is simple: leave workshop, get coffee, eat, return to workshop. If he doesn't plan he doesn't get kissed as much, if he doesn't eat he doesn't get kissed at all... it's extremely aggravating and inconvenient and there is no denying that life was a lot simpler when he got his kisses (and other things. Mostly other things. Kissing was for teenagers.) from people who didn't care if he dropped dead right after, let alone if he ate or Followed Plans.

But the whole world knows by now that Tony Stark would find a way to rearrange the solar system if Pepper Potts asked him to, because he told _Rolling Stone_ so just the other month, so he puts a food-related Plan in place and wanders out of the workshop. That's Step One, he should make a note so Pepper knows how many kisses she owes him.

(God, he sounds like a lovestruck fifteen-year-old. Well, twenty years late is better than never.)

He weaves through the Tower yawning his head off, mind still running along circuit-boards and wires, when: out into the kitchen-cum-dining area which _technically_ still belongs to Tony and Pepper's private space but has become a victim of Avenger-wide aggressive colonisation politics, and Cap is hunched over the dining table, eyes bruised and shadowed and lost.

There's a gun on the table in front of him.

A heartbeat later Tony realises it's disassembled. He's surprised at how relieved that makes him feel - he doesn't seriously think Steve's suicidal, does he?

Well, how about he asks Steve.

Cap glances up, sees him in the doorway. Tony can practically see the tension in him.

"Hey."

"Morning. You're up early."

Steve's mouth twitches. "You're up late."

"Very true. S'that for?" Tony gestures at the gun.

"Oh. Nothing. I left my bedroom with it, and didn't realise - and then I was standing in the kitchen and noticed I had it and just - I mean, how stupid is that? Safest place in the world, I can't even leave it behind to get juice."

"You, uh, don't usually carry one."

"Oh," says Steve, "that's just the new uniform. Actually killing _aliens_ is easier with the shield. People, on the other hand..."

Tony sits down opposite him. "I forget that sometimes," he says bluntly.

"I get the impression that a lot of people do." He falls silent for a moment or three. “I like it better,” he says at last. “Not carrying a gun with me. It feels – well, I like killing people even less than I like bullies.”

There’s a private joke there. Tony reads it in the twist of his lips, the lift of his voice.

"But the shield’s a little big for a security blanket?"

"Security blanket," Steve repeats, somewhere between amused and rueful and kind of embarrassed.

"Hey, I built myself a suit of armour that folds into a briefcase so I can take it with me wherever I go. Once I tried carrying it into a general shareholder's meeting but Pepper confiscated it. I twitched my way through the entire meeting and jumped every time someone tapped on the microphone."

That's actually a true story. Steve laughs a quick, startled laugh to hear it.

"I always sort of think," he says, pushing the clip around on the table top with a fingertip, "that I’m the only one who does it. I didn’t think that at home.” And how fucked up is it that he says _at home_ and means _during the war_?  “We were all soldiers, and we all knew where we stood and what we were doing and we’d all seen the same things, we all had the same nightmares. Here… here it’s different.” His blue eyes are red-rimmed when he looks at Tony, bruises painted underneath. “Captain America, the perfect icon. Well, he doesn’t exist. I’m Steve Rogers, and he’s a soldier same as the rest of them.”

“You thought about talking to someone?” Tony asks bluntly.

Steve considers him curiously. “You mean like a psychoanalyst?”

“Yeah.”

“Not really. Did you?”

Tony pulls a face and pushes the clip around himself. It makes a scratchy noise on the table top.

“Nope. I… built the Iron Man suit instead.”

“Well, that was dumb. Perfectly in character, but dumb.”

“So you’re gonna…”

Steve laughs again. “I’m gonna be Captain America.”

Tony grins. “Sounds like a blast. Hey, I hear the guy has awesome team mates.”

“Yeah, he’s gettin’ kind of fond of them. They’re doin’ OK, I guess.”

 

*********

 

**(II)**

 

Tasha's unconscious. Her head is lolling, horrifically, from side to side with the motion of the truck, and there is a long trickle of blood running out of (same colour as) her hair, down the side of her face, along her jaw.

There's cold gunmetal pressed to Bucky's temple. The guy's a fool, he's standing far too close, close enough that Bucky can feel the heat off his body. It wouldn't take much, and if he were alone he'd move.

But he's not reckless enough to think that he can fight the other three in these close confines before one of them puts a bullet in Tasha's brainpan, let alone reckless enough to jump off the back of the truck with her still unconscious and a second truckful of thugs driving merrily along behind them. There are bad plans, and then there are Bad Plans: bad plans only succeed because they’re not really plans at all and you make them up as you go along, but Bad Plans are the sort that everyone knows are impossible right from the get-go. As a member of the Howling Commandos, Bucky likes his plans precise, professional and well-executed. As a Brooklyn almost-street-kid and Steve Rogers’ best friend, Bucky has a fondness for the manic, improbable, entertaining bad plan. As neither of these things will you ever catch him dead trying a Bad Plan.

There's only so much even Black Widow and the Winter Soldier can do against superior numbers, or at least the kind of superior numbers that have the unspeakable bad manners to grab you out of your hotel room in Seattle just after you've...

... well, there's a reason he's shirtless and barefoot. And Tasha's in a nightdress. It's a small mercy they were allowed to dress even that far and it tells Bucky more about their captors than they realised. One of those things is: these guys aren't as smart as they think they are. Nakedness means vulnerability, humiliation, fear - in short it's an effective weapon, or would be if he were anyone other than who he is, and they're not making use of it.

Even before he Fell he knew better than to waste an advantage. Off the battlefield Steve argues with that point of view (because of course he does, he's Steve and feels morally obligated), but that's a moot point, because Steve isn't here.

The road is potholed and twists and turns excessively. They must be heading into the hills, winding upwards into the woods. It's full daylight now. No sun on the canvas overhead, which probably means a canopy of trees above them, but the heat is more than enough for Bucky, filling the air with a close sticky smell of sweat and guns and wet, rotting cloth.

Tasha's legs lie helplessly sprawled across the floor of the truck, thrown almost between his own bare feet. The metal floor is oddly warm under his soles, covered in dirt, dead pine needles.

"So," he says at last. "Ransom, I guess?"

The guy standing by Tasha's body with the rifle trained on her stomach flicks his head as if chasing off a fly buzzing by his ear. "From who?" he sneers.

"Tony Stark," says Bucky.

There's a cackle of laughter.

"Sure, sunshine. Sure. I guess you and Red here are his closest friends. Wait, is she Pepper Potts?"

OK, Bucky's starting to feel equal parts embarrassed and gleeful. They're amateurs, they don't know jack about anything. On the other hand: they're amateurs, this is humiliating.

Suddenly the anxious glances they've been shooting at his arm make a lot more sense.

"No, really. What's he like?"

"Who?" says Bucky. "Oh, Tony. He's a good kid. Better than his old man, Howard always rubbed me the wrong way, just a little. I never really had time for guys on the bases who didn't fight on the front line. Form of snobbery I guess. Tony’s not like that. Smokin' girlfriend, though I like mine better." He grins, tilts his head, puts a touch of savagery into it. Rifle Guy swallows hard, but rallies.

"And I guess you're on first name terms with Captain America, too."

That one deserves nothing but a burst of laughter, long and loud and genuine. _Since we were children, asshole_. Even while he's laughing the truck rolls and judders to a halt; there's footsteps, voices, someone throws the canvas back - _get 'em out here_. They drag Natasha, hands under her armpits; her heels hit the ground when they manhandle her out of the back of the truck. Bucky sees a flinch, and thinks ha, you're awake. Hang in there, Nat. You and I, we're unstoppable.

Besides which they planned to fly home today. When they're not on the flight Steve and Tony will know something's happened, and then things around here will be due to get interesting.

(Bucky remembers Clint getting shot last year: first time he'd been out since Leaving, since coming home, since being cleared and welcomed and accepted, and he remembers the sheer fury on Steve's face, how abruptly he, Bucky, realised just how screwed he truly was. Someone should have told him the Avengers were an all-or-nothing proposition. He still would have said yes (red in his ledger) ( _that little guy from Brooklyn who was too dumb to walk away from a fight, I'll follow him_ ) (red in his ledger), but at least he would have known what he was getting into in advance: how far he was getting in, and how irrevocably. Oh well. Too late now to pretend he regrets it.)

They're in a clearing. There's a log cabin, a small bonfire in a pit, a man in a suit. They let Nat fall to the mud at his feet. Silence, probably meant to intimidate, but now Bucky is starting to get irritated.

"Well?" he says at last, and puts all the command and arrogance and power he can into his voice.

Suit Guy blinks. "Well, as the saying goes, Mr Martimer," he says. "You and your lovely wife here have got something that belongs to me. I'd like it back."

They checked into the hotel as Buchanan. Wait, that couple across the hall. The woman has red hair too and is about Tasha's height; her husband's brown, but longer than Bucky's; they're both clean-shaven and fairly pale.

Well, hel-lo Mr and Mrs Martimer. Bucky puts his hands in his pockets and sighs. Steve is _never_ going to let him hear the end of this.

Nat's fingers twitch. He knows what that means.

"I'm sorry," he says, putting 'disdainful' and 'polite' into his voice. "I have absolutely no idea what you're talking about."

It's a cliche, and for once it's true. The guy who hits him with the rifle butt doesn't seem too inclined to believe it. Nat's fingers spread against the ground, flexing; he can see the muscles in her calves tense, and knowing she's awake and aware and OK does a lot for his peace of mind but shatters his patience.

Numbers or not the fight doesn't last long. Amateurs, as previously mentioned, but clever enough to realise when they’re outmatched at least, so most of the second truckful gets the hell out of Dodge while Bucky’s shooting Rifle Guy’s kneecaps out. His vicious streak gets the better of him sometimes. It’s a thing. Natasha says it’s inefficient, and she’s not wrong, but Steve understands.

 

They sit side by side on the porch of the cabin and mop each other's scratches up with the ease of long practice.

"Better call the cops," says Tasha.

"Better call Tony, I want a chopper out of here," says Bucky.

"Better not tell Clint about this," and that they say together, laughing. He wipes a wet cloth along the side of her face, smoothing away the dried blood, clearing the marks off her skin. Nat edges closer to him, hooks her bare legs over his lap.

"There was a moment in the hotel room when I thought..."

"Yeah," he says, because they were woken like that once before, dragged apart naked and fighting to get back to each other, and the next time he laid eyes on her he no longer remembered their stolen hours in the dark, nor the colour of her eyes or the sound of her voice; not even her name.

She leans against him and closes her eyes. "But we're OK."

"Yeah," Bucky says again. "Yeah, Nat, we're OK."

 

*********

 

**(III)**

 

Steve has a Plan for this weekend, and it involves a great deal of Doing Nothing and even more Peggy. He's sprawled in an armchair with a book when she comes in on Friday night, and when she snaps the lights on it makes his eyes water.

"You really shouldn't do that," she says, but her tone is more tired than amused.

"I'm used to it."

"Dug-outs, trenches, reading under bushes by Polish roadsides."

"The orphanage didn't believe in issuing us reading lamps, either."

She laughs and sighs and then just gives in and groans, dropping her suit jacket on the coffee table - which makes him smile; it has taken them both far too long to readjust to semi-civilian life, but one of the sure signs of success is occasional untidiness - and collapsing into the couch.

"Bad day?"

"Long day." Peggy draws her right leg up and slips her shoe off, dangling it from her hand. Steve tilts his head and watches the angle of her limbs, the fall of the black suit trousers against her calf, thinks put your head back, just a little, relax your shoulders - that would be perfect.

"Are you drawing me in your head again?"

He jumps.

"Only a sketch."

Peggy rolls her head to the side against the back of the couch, smiling a sad, shadowed smile. "It's a very flattering scrutiny. Especially to a girl whose whole body aches and whose make-up is smudged and who is frankly beginning to feel a little concerned about the state of her romantic life because her lover cannot even be bothered to stand up and - hmf! _Hmmm_."

Steve can move very, very quickly indeed when he has to. People sometimes forget that; sometimes he forgets it himself. Memory prodded, his interest strays to slipping Peggy's left shoe off, and continuing to kiss her.

 

She does not usually like to sleep with him wrapped around her - neither of them do - too confining. If they can slide out of bed and grab a gun at a moment's notice, they're comfortable. Tonight, for whatever reason, she doesn't seem to want to lose any inch of contact between them.

"You'd tell me," he says, "if I could help."

Peggy presses back against his chest; she has her head pillowed on his bicep, and very probably even Steve will end up with cramp by morning.

"You do," she says quietly.

 

In the morning her shadows are gone.

"I arrested an arms dealer yesterday," she says over breakfast. "He'd got his hands on some tech from that business rival of Tony's, Justin Hammer, you know. Anyway, his daughter came running in as we were reading the charges, and... oh, the way she looked. White as a sheet. Then she punched him."

In spite of himself, Steve grins.

Peggy laughs. "I liked her too," she agrees. "So is there a plan?"

"For this weekend?"

"Mmm."

"A rudimentary one. Did you have one?"

"This weekend? Emphatically not. I know you wanted to see that new exhibition though -"

"It's opening week, the place will be crowded."

"Oh, that's true. Next weekend, then. Or Thursday, I think I'm owed a Thursday off."

"There's always Thursday. We're out of milk though, and a couple other things."

Peggy rolls her eyes. "I don't understand why you Americans can't have milkmen like the rest of the civilised world."

"Because we're living in _New York City_ ," Steve says, exaggeratedly patient.

 

So really, them getting caught in the bomb blast, entirely _his_ fault. He should have known better than to make _any_ kind of plan for the weekend.

 

Steve only ever swears when things like this happen: unprovoked attacks and unarmed civilians.

"It'll be all right," says Peggy, but whether she's talking to him or to the boy whose bleeding leg she's tying a tourniquet around is another question. "You'll see."

(The worst thing is: this is their own fault. The battle with Loki made Stark Tower and indeed all of Steve's city a target as surely as if they'd painted a bull's-eye on the side. So You Want To Rule The World? First Succeed Where Even A God Could Not!)

Half the street has collapsed, there's a crater in the road large as a swimming pool, dust and ash in the air and the smell of burning and Steve's hands are wet red crusted brown with other people's blood and he can feel the skin of his back healing, the closing flesh pushing the shards of glass out to snag and scratch and rip some more between his skin and his shirt. Peggy had not shouted at him for shielding her, not this time.

A child's body broken in the rubble of a cafe while his mother screams, head wound, half a glass table sliced through her gut, Steve can't help her, she's dead and doesn't know it -

Crawling to the crater edge, very clever, too careful to be amateur, too destructive to be amateur and some other sense than hearing, which is still blown to hell for the minute if you'll pardon the pun, tells him someone's coming up behind him.

 

He wants his shield: the absence of its weight on his arm is like phantom pain in a missing limb.

 

For some reason he hears Peggy's gunshots very clearly. Drop an attacker, take their gun, shoot two more, _get under cover_ you stupid punk _you don't have the shield_ , and that voice in his head will never not sound like Bucky.

Peggy, beside him, gun in her hands. The ringing in his ears has mostly subsided, but his hearing's now being assaulted by the sirens and the shouts and the damn police megaphone yelling about their attackers having to give themselves up.

They never have to do anything. That's the first thing you learn about people who put aside their conscience.

"Anything to do with your arms dealer?" Steve shouts.

"But how is killing me going to help him?"

"Did you say you'd testify or something?"

"After this he'll be damn lucky to wrangle a trial out of Fury!" Peggy straightens above the overturned car they're crouching behind and gets another shot off; Steve doesn't need to see the body drop to know she's hit her mark. He checks his stolen gun: almost full, that's good, moves to the end of the car and Tony drops out of the sky between them and the shooters.

That would have been enough to end the fight right there even if the next thing to happen weren't Bucky's hand on Steve's shoulder, and the gleam of Clint's glasses above and behind their attackers, and Nat's red hair, and Bruce pushing past the policemen, and thunderclouds rolling in overhead.

"You idiots OK?" asks Bucky, grinning viciously. He's furious and he's itching for a fight; it's frightening and flattering at the same time.

"Yes," says Peggy, dry as dust, "thank you, Bucky, we're both perfectly fine."

"Are you sure," says Steve, "we can't even plan for groceries without getting blown up," and Bucky starts laughing, white-faced with relief.

 

*********

 

**(IV)**

 

For obvious reasons, it's always Tony. No one else ever gets shot at in the coffee queue unless they're with him.

No one, that is, except Pepper Potts, CEO of Stark Industries and a relatively big fish to fry in her own right. She was the one who saw the glint on the rooftop - flash and gone - but nearly a decade of being Tony's PA, constantly surrounded by his bodyguards, had taught her caution in such things, and nearly three years of being his lover had taught her more. Almost before she'd thought of it, her hand had dropped to grip the elbow of the friend she was having coffee with.

"Maria - up there -"

Hill's head turned so fast it probably gave her whiplash, and then she fell sideways on top of Pepper, bearing her to the ground: "Everyone get down!"

A bullet zipped through the air where they had been standing and shattered a vase on a table. There was an explosion of screaming, tables overturned, people running - "No!" Pepper yelled at the girl who ran across the small square into the line of fire, and then cried out again, wordlessly, when the bullet's impact spun her to the floor, bleeding. Maria's hand closed around her friend's neck and collar ruthlessly, dragging Pepper like an unruly dog. "Pep - this way - come on!"

Two more bullets, more screaming, they crawled behind an overturned table which itself was positioned conveniently close to a great rectangular cement flowerpot, tall as a child and filled with some enthusiastically growing bush, and crouched there. Pepper was shaking. Maria was not.

Goddammit she’d had a Plan – coffee with Maria, call Sarah on her way back to work, check on Tony, go to lunch with Floria Norton Grant. It’d been a good Plan. Pepper had liked it.

"We can't stay here forever," Pepper said. "Here." How the hell she'd managed to keep a grip on her phone was beyond even her. Her sunglasses had fallen off; she'd put a hand in the shards crawling away and the heel of it was dripping blood onto the wristband of the watch her mother had bought her for her fifteenth birthday. "SHIELD?"

"Hell no," said Maria. "Call Tony direct. Get him down here, get Nat as well, hell all of them." She had a gun in her hand; Pepper could see the holster under her jacket now.

"This is probably just a random kill the CEO of Stark Industries thing," said Pepper, pleased with how steady her voice was while her hands shook.

"Or it's a random kill Iron Man's girlfriend thing," said Maria. "Pep, you have no idea -"

Another two - three bullets thunked into a table three feet away, barely audible over the growing wail of sirens. Pepper jumped.

"Trying to scare us out," said Maria calmly. "Wait. Just wait."

And finally, on the other end of the line -

"Pepper, God, is that you?"

"The building opposite the square," she said. "Red brick, there's a green shirt hanging out of one of the top windows, he's on the roof."

"Hurry, Stark!" Maria shouted.

Tony hurried. Maria wouldn't let Pepper look up over the rim of the table, but they could both hear it when he arrived. Probably half of New York could.

Then a noise of footsteps running and the scrape of jeans against smooth marble underfoot, and Clint slid to a halt just short of cannoning into them. "You guys OK?"

"Fine," said Maria crisply. "No chance at the shooter."

"Course not," said Clint. "You handle NYPD? I'm going after Tony. Pep. Nice catch."

And he was gone.

 

"I'm in shock," she said afterwards to Steve, perched in the ambulance waiting for Tony, surrounded by sirens and police officers and what seemed, just then, like an impenetrable wall of Avengers, "look, I've got a blanket."

Ten feet away the body of the poor girl who'd run into the line of fire earlier lay zipped into a body bag. Pepper needed to know her name with an ache that matched her ache for Tony's voice and face and arms.

"Oh, Pep," said Steve, and put his arm around her. They must have sat there for a good five minutes before Clint and Tony arrived. Pepper jumped up, let the blanket drop, totally uncaring of her stockinged feet on the tarmac, and more or less fell against Tony.

"Pepper - God, Pepper - are you OK? Lemme - Christ, when Jarvis threw up that news report -"

The last time she had seen him this dreadfully pale he had been missing the arc reactor in his chest. They staggered a step or two and bumped into the side of the ambulance; Pepper's ribs hurt where he clutched her and she was close to ripping his t-shirt, she had such a grip on it.

"I'm OK," she said into the side of his neck. "I'm OK. Tony, I'm OK."

 

 

*********

 

**(V)**

 

Clint is kind of maybe a little bit more susceptible to mind-control than the others. It’s not enough to show up on the medical reports; no one outside of the immediate circle of the Avengers has noticed the trend. But Loki battered down defences in his mind that seem to have never entirely recovered and occasionally people who have similar abilities appear to sense that in Clint, and target him first among the Avengers. The others make Plans meant to ensure that he doesn't get too close to world-domination-wanting hypnotists and psychics who can't or won't control their damn powers and think that Clint isn’t aware of them doing so.

Of course, said well-intentioned strategies doesn't always work as well as they'd like them to.

He smells something dusty, concrete, metal and mud. The light's sort of dim when he manages to get his eyes open, and the first thing he sees is a blurry line of blue at his left hand. It's several moments before he realises he's looking at Cap.

"Steve?" he croaks. God, his head is pounding. And there is a wet trail of blood snaking down his face, crusted on his skin: it's a struggle to focus his eyes enough to recognise his own blood on his fingertips.

Well, this can't be good.

"Steve?" he says again. God, there's blood...

... there's blood everywhere.

Christ no God please. Clint tries to struggle upright in the rubble - they're in a cave - no, under a building, mostly collapsed - and - and shit, that's not Steve's blood, it's Clint's own.

He's actually sort of relieved.

OK, leg trapped, blood all over, ribs - never mind his actual ribs, he's more worried about the vicious cut slanting down his right side what happened to him, he can barely  -

Hands on his shoulders.

"Clint, it's me," says Steve's voice. "Hold" - he coughs - "hold steady, OK?" He shifts behind Clint, who is now reduced to leaning against his chest like a fainting damsel in distress and shaking.

"It doesn't hurt," he says. "Steve, my legs -"

"I think it's more likely your brain's still scrambled," says Steve. "Can you feel that along your ribs?"

Hmm. Actually, no. That's comforting.

"What happened?"

Pause. "You... hit me. I hit back."

Clint feels sick. "I tried to kill you."

"It didn't take."

"Oh, God."

"Shut up. Not your fault."

"How many more times is this going to happen?"

"I don't know," Steve says bluntly. "How many more times is Tony going to get kidnapped and tortured for arc reactor technology? How many more times am I going to survive something I shouldn't?"

"Melodrama," says Clint, "you should survive all the things, you're Steve."

He can say that because Steve is behind him, not in front, and they can't see each other's faces.

"Well... thanks."

"Shut up."

What the hell, Barton. Next thing you'll be running your mouth off about all your feelings re: Steve's stupid habit of trusting people to do their jobs and not be mind-controlled even in the face of overwhelming proof of the opposite and how he manages to think Clint is somehow fundamentally a nice person and all kinds of dumabss shit like that.

Nat's probably responsible for at least half of those delusions.

"I need a drink," he says out loud.

Steve laughs. "That makes two of us. Hey, listen. I think that's the Hulk. We're gonna be OK."

 

*********

 

**(VI)**

 

Bruce is on comms again - he generally is when the Plan involves being, you know, _stealthy_ instead of going in guns a-blazing. He's got a steady eye (scientist, duh) and a cool head (of necessity); he doesn't much _like_ feeling as if he's the only thing holding his team together, all the webs of their lives resting in his hands, ready to snap if he calls the wrong position or mixes signals up, but he gets better at it, though Clint's been known to tease him for his lack of proper military terminology.

He misses Tony's sharp voice in his ear, the running commentary of sarcasm and encouragement. They all do. It feels as if everyone else's words fall flat without it - Nat's dry asides, Steve's pragmatic common sense, Thor's occasional tendency for good-natured melodrama, Clint's sharpness.

Bruce can feel the veins in his arms pulsing, the creep across his skin. He ignores it. The Hulk's no use here. At the first sign of him they'll simply kill Tony. Thor hasn't gone in either; he's waiting outside, above the facility, struggling with his own impatience. This is a job for a couple of master assassins and the guy who spent years leading raids against some of the most well-guarded and dangerous rogue Nazi facilities on the European continent.

It's a broken-down factory in the wilds of the Ukraine, and it shouldn't exactly be difficult for them. Barely twenty minutes ago the whole damn thing went offline, presumably thanks to faulty equipment. That was a godsend, the perfect opportunity to get inside.

The plan is simple: get in, be quiet, find Tony, be quiet, get out. _Then_ Thor (and maybe the Other Guy) can have their share of the fun.

"Guys," says Bruce, watching their signals move along the corridors, pinpoints of light through hologram blueprints. "Talk to me."

"Widow, six A-7b," says Nat crisply. Middle left side of Bruce's screen. "Three down behind me. No signal on Tony?"

"Not yet," says Bruce.

"Rogers, heading your way, Nat," says Steve. "I think the cells are on your level."

"What, no basements?" says Clint.

"Perhaps they forgot to build one," Thor says dryly.

Bruce grins; there's a huff of laughter from the others over his earpiece. Then a swift dull thump, another body hitting the ground though who put them down Bruce doesn't know - and Clint's voice, swearing sulphurously, furious and low.

Christ on a cracker, what's happened?

"Clint. Clint!"

"Barton, report, dammit," snaps Steve, and his voice gets through where nobody else's would.

"Cap, we need to find Tony and we need to find him _right the fuck now_ ," says Clint, fiercely controlled, but Bruce imagines him shaking with fury, alive with it. " _They're powering the facility with his arc reactor_."

"What!"

There's a silence that seems to stretch forever, nothing but air in and out of Bruce's lungs, nothing but his heartbeat, the roaring of blood in his ears. Then he says, "Steve, I'm really sorry, but if I ever had any self-control at all it's just disappeared."

"Yes," says Steve. "Get out here. Thor, you too. Clint, get the reactor out, you and Nat find Tony and find him _now_. I'm going to hunt down the bastard that did this and _kill him slowly_."

 

Bruce doesn’t usually like having to fall back on Plan B, but he doesn’t mind the sound of this one.

 

Tony's passed out when they reach him, bruised and bloodied, pale and sweat-soaked, breathing in hitches and gasps but _breathing_ , thank God thank all the Gods, and Nat holds him still as Clint's steady hands lower the arc reactor back into its proper place in his chest.

Click. A hum, almost unnoticeable. Familiar blue light washes over their faces, over Tony's own stupid arrogant (beloved) face.

Almost immediately, his breathing eases. Almost immediately, a tiny bit of colour comes back into his skin.

"Cap," says Nat, and her voice _does not break_. "We got him. He's OK."

 

*********

 

**(VII)**

 

The first time the Lady Sif and the Warriors Three came to visit things were a little weird, and the Asgardians didn't stay long. Not that they didn't _like_ each other, the Warriors were obviously good people and everyone had a lot of cautious mutual respect, which was the only way to go, really, when two groups of (for the most part) highly trained and (without exception) overly dangerous people met (unless, of course, you _wanted_ copious bloodshed and mass property destruction. Which had also happened before. There had been that one time in Toronto when Coulson had said "Actually, Mr Godwin, I don't even care at this point", and Clint and Nat had taken that as literally as it had been meant.). But there was a certain tension in the air, as if they were all eyeing each other up, ready to vie for the honour of Being Thor's Team.

Fortunately their teams have a Sif and a Natasha respectively, so the worst that happened were a few belligerent glares.

(After this Clint is fairly sure that if ever the Howling Commandos were to unexpectedly drop through a rift in the space-time continuum to modern-day New York, it would end in blood regardless. They all love Thor, but Steve is Steve.)

"My father wishes me to return to Asgard," says Thor at breakfast the morning after the others left. "There are, apparently, matters to discuss. Sif spoke of him as having made Plans for the future."

There's a pause while the Avengers digest this information. It takes longer than usual because, well, breakfast, ergo early in the morning.

"Well," says Bruce, "if it's important..."

Tony snorts.

"D'you _want_ to go?" Steve asks casually. There's a consensus in the Tower that of all of them, Steve understands Thor best - even better than Jane, really, or Selvig. If you ask Clint, he'll tell you that it's because they're both basically college-age kids who've had a bit too much responsibility and way too much war piled on their shoulders, but no one ever asks Clint. (He doesn't mind. It's none of anyone's business but Steve and Thor's.)

Thor sighs, and stabs a fried tomato with his fork. "Not particularly."

"Because we're awesome and charming and you don't want to leave us?" Clint hazards, feeling amused. Every now and then he can just about _taste_ how much older he is than the boys. He's fairly sure Tony, Nat and Bruce all feel the same way. Probably Pepper and Betty do too. (Coulson feels older than all of them, that's always been clear.)

"I am not..." Thor pauses, searching for words. "Prepared to be lectured, I suppose. I am doing what I think is best. Unless the All-Father intends to drop dead where he stands within the next few years, there is no need for me in Asgard."

"Hey, look," says Tony. "Don't, uh. Don't go feeling sulky. That won't end well."

Everyone looks at him.

"Children, try not to argue with the voice of experience. It's bad form."

"He's got a point," says Steve to Thor.

"You've never spoken of your own father," says Thor, suddenly curious.

Steve shrugs. "Never had one."

"Immaculate conception?" says Tony, amused. "Fits your image, Cap, Saviour of America and all..."

"Idiot," says Steve companionably. "No, he died in the Great War. Before I was born, actually."

"The Great War?" asks Thor.

"Oh, uh, the First World War. In the trenches."

And twenty-five years later you got to pick up where he left off. God, humanity makes Clint sick some days.

"I am sorry to have raised so painful a subject," says Thor.

Steve shakes his head. "It's not painful. I never knew him. You can't miss what you never had."

Oh, he's such a bad liar. Really, really terrible. Clint and Bruce catch each other's eye across the table and take a moment to share their exasperation (Type 2b: fond). It's a bonding experience.

"Anyway, we were talking about you going home."

"I suspect I must," says Thor.

The logical conclusion to that sentence is _but that doesn't mean I have to like it_. The God of Thunder is just too well-brought-up to say it out loud, which is cute, and even cuter that he’s thinking it at all, because hello: God of Thunder, but then again, in a lot of ways said God of Thunder is a bundle of contradictions on the maturity front.

They all are, really. One of Clint's favourite movies is fucking _Toy Story_ , for God's sake.

It's a coping mechanism. That still doesn't necessarily explain Tony Stark, but Clint is OK with that. Only God, Steve Rogers and Pepper Potts can explain Tony fucking Stark. Clint doesn't need to understand the guy to love him like a brother.

 

Not that he does love him like a brother. Like, at all. Nu-uh.

 

Oh, who's he even trying to kid.

 

It's just easier to admit affection for the golden boys because every now and then they do have brief flashes of moments when they're both terribly, horribly young. Thor's only come in relation to his immediate family. Steve's show through in the sheer force of his idealism, of his conviction that doing the right thing is always the only possible choice; and then, more quietly, in those few moments when they catch him alone and unable to sleep for nightmares, wrung out and afraid. (But that's happened twice in over two years; Steve hates them to see him like that. The only person he can stand to be around in those moments is Tony, and Tony would kill himself before he'd betray that trust even to the rest of the Avengers by telling them how easy – or how difficult – a time Steve is having.)

 

 

So yeah: occasionally the boys need... not looking after, for fuck's sake, they are adults, also, remember what Clint said earlier about overly dangerous and highly trained, just... just a minute or three, to get their heads straight about something, which maybe the rest of them would not need in their situations, or then again maybe they would, it’s hard to tell; look, the Avengers have issues, OK?

 

What they don’t really have, any of them, is patience for or with people who make Plans for them, unless those people are Pepper Potts or Betty Ross or Phil Coulson or Darcy Lewis (you wouldn’t catch Jane Foster with a workable Plan for anything if the world depended on it). Clint is not sure whether or not Thor has ever yet applied the irritation he has been known to express with Fury’s more underhanded moments to a conversation with his father, but as Thor leaves he thinks he might be about to find out.

 

Six hours later, Thor’s return announces itself with an almighty crash of thunder and a lashing of rain across New York.

"That went well, then," says Tony dryly. Thor strides in half a heartbeat later and drops Mjolnir with a crash.

"I have never been so tempted to strike a man in my life," he seethes. "And certainly not -"

Well, no.

"What did he say?" asks Steve.

"Nonsense," snaps Thor. Then he softens. "I don't know. He said I should come home, that he had a plan for me, that I had other duties. Like as not he has a point." He falls silent then, which makes Bruce sigh.

"You might as well get it all out," he says.

Thor's mouth twitches. It's not quite a smile.

"This is my fault," he says quietly. "My foolishness drew attention to your world once more. And were that not enough, Loki is my brother. If he will not make recompense..."

"You don't have to - to take his place," says Tony.

Haven't you taken Stane's? thinks Clint. Haven't you taken his guilt into yourself?

"Did he accept it?" asks Steve, watching Thor intently.

"Unhappily, but yes," Thor admits.

Natasha snorts. "Well, at least we've avoided an interplanetary incident."

Thor glances at her. She shrugs. "Sorry. The nearest thing I had to parents were handlers."

And she shot them, each and every one, a perfect bullet to the back of the head while Clint stood and watched and smiled to see their blood creep red across the white tiled floor.

_Not_ a good role model for methods of dealing with inter-generational conflict.

"Come on," he says, jumping off his chair. "This is a damn depressing conversation - worse than the weather - and I'm sure Thor's sick of thinking about it. I know I am. Let's watch _Raiders of the Lost Ark_."

Steve snorts. " _Last Crusade_ , surely," he says, and now everyone laughs.

Yeah, they'll be OK.


End file.
